Dance: Youd know if youd been tangoed

The erotic Argentinian dance has been reborn  and its sexier than ever. By Mark Espiner

The dancer’s sculpted foot, cupped in a strapped, 3in-heel shoe and wrapped in fish-net stockings, entwines with the leg of her partner. Their steps, strenuous and melting, stridently articulate that famous description of the tango: the vertical expression of horizontal desire. The crowd gawps.

This wasn’t breezy Buenos Aires, though — it all took place on the banks of the Thames rather than the Plate. Still more disorienting was that the sex-charged leg-rubbing was way larger than life — 20ft larger — played as it was on a huge television screen. And as the dancing duo spun on the screen, some big, bassy beats kicked in. The tango went techno and the crowd went crackers.

The band responsible for tangoing the Ibiza generation last summer in the courtyard of Somerset House were the Paris-based Gotan Project — their name an anagram of the dance music they are on a mission to sex up. But